Month: August 2012

I can hear you now: “Really? A Madonna song? How can anything by Madonna be forgotten?” (This may not in reality be what you are saying, but as this is my blog I get to assume that you are in fact saying these things just after reading the title to this entry, and so we’ll proceed from that assumption.)

Well, if I were to consider Madonna’s career in pop music, I would say that the Erotica album/era is in fact the most forgotten portion.

(Erotica peaked at #2 on the Billboard 200 and spawned four Top 40 hits. And I don’t think any of them get airplay. Album ℗1992 Sire Records. Photo courtesy Amazon.com.)

And why is this? Perhaps it is because Madonna was at that time infamous for making a coffee table book in which she was wearing very little, if any, clothing. (Now she’s just infamous for continuing to dress as if she were still that age.) Or it may have been because the songs from this album were not as successful as singles from other albums of hers. Wikipedia reports that no song from the album Erotica charted any higher than number three. Or maybe the pop-music populace didn’t care as much for the songs of that era in which, as Idolator.com says (in a list of the 10 most forgotten Madonna songs–in which “Erotica” does not appear), Madonna “gabbed through tracks rather than singing on them.”

In any case, regardless of the reason, I personally do not believe that I have heard the title track on any radio station since its original run on the Hot 100 in late 1992/early 1993. And this I find rather strange, since it had such a strong debut; it debuted on Billboard’s Hot 100 at number thirteen for the week ending October 17, 1992 (chart | magazine) and reached its peak position of number three the next week (chart | magazine), lasting 18 weeks on the Hot 100. It also reached number two on Billboard’s airplay chart (debuting and peaking at that position on October 17*), which makes it doubly strange to me that it now receives, as far as I can tell, absolutely no airplay now.

According to commenter “BLT” at SongMeanings.net, Madonna intended this song to serve as a fantasy of “crazy and nasty things that go through [one’s] mind,” but are never acted on.

The video, which may presently be found on YouTube, was banned by MTV for content reasons, which, given the high standards of MTV, should tell you a lot. This video will not be presented here, sorry.

I’m not gonna lie: what made me think of this was a comment by a politician who stated, “I’m all in favor of girls with guns who know their purpose.” How could this child of the 80s not think of Tommy Shaw?

You wouldn’t think a popular song from the soundtrack of a movie such
as Beverly Hills Cop II would be listed as a “forgotten song”. You wouldn’t think that a song that hit number one on Billboard’s Hot 100 would be listed as such. You certainly wouldn’t think that a song that won an Oscar as Best Song would be forgotten. (Or, at least, I wouldn’t think so.) And yet, when the word “shakedown” hit the public discourse a couple of years ago as the result of a sitting congressman using it to discuss the government’s treatment of BP after the Gulf oil spill*, at least one person (that I knew of) was not familiar at all with this song, so I figured it deserved to be dug out.

(The soundtrack toBeverly Hills Cop II spent 26 weeks on the Billboard 200, peaking at #8 and spawning several Top 40 hits. Album ℗1987 MCA Special Products. Photo courtesy Amazon.com.)

“Shakedown” was actually written for Glenn Frey, but Bob Seger stepped in when Mr. Frey lost his voice just before the recording session. This was Mr. Seger’s only number one single (it spent 18 weeks on the Hot 100, and, per the song’s Wikipedia entry, it also hit number one on the Album Rock Tracks chart) and his next-to-last top 40 hit overall. And, as is usual for songs I list as “forgotten songs”, I don’t think I have ever heard a station where I have lived play this song in many years. Actually, for that matter, I think I might have heard this song once on the radio since it hit the charts back in 1987. I’m pretty sure that one time was a 1987 flashback feature, played the week that “Shakedown” hit number one (that being the week of August 1, 1987 (chart)).

*As I have stated before, I am only interested in discussing music here. Political statements, especially those of a couple of years ago, are not a topic of discussion in this post…it only inspired the choice of this song.

A few months before my last forgotten song honoree hit the charts, a California girl named Tara Kemp hit the top ten with two songs from her eponymous and only album. The first, “Hold You Tight”, went gold and is, to my knowledge, still somewhat familiar to people. For years, this song was the only Tara Kemp offering available for request at, for example, Austin’s Bob FM. (Since then, they now show all tracks from her album as being available. Yeah, right. I’ve never even heard them play “Hold You Tight” in eight years of operation.) Continue reading “Piece of My Heart by Tara Kemp”